4/28/15 | summer is here already

Hey family!

This week was awesome! I'm staying in Hollywood and so is Elder Hayward, super excited to be able to continue to work with him to get this zone to where it needs to be.

We didn't find hardly anyone after knocking doors for hours until Sunday afternoon.  We worked so hard throughout the week and didn't find no matter what we did.  We made a mental shift from stressing to find so that our are looked good, to stressing to find so that we could save people's souls.  Once we made that shift the work started progressing again.

We had a HUGE miracle yesterday!  We got asked by a member to track down Haitian members and hand out the flyers for the Haitian conference that's coming up.  We started doing that yesterday afternoon and the first person we tried wasn't home so we decided to OYM this family sitting across the yard.  We talked with them and prayed with them and they were interested in being baptized, so we taught the restoration and they understood it perfectly!  It turns out that there are 2 families living there and they all want to be baptized, we got to teach just 4 of them but will catch the rest tomorrow.  We already have more people to teach than we did almost all of last week, God is good!

Also on Sunday we had dinner at our RC's (tasiea) house and had some Indian food because her family is from Trinidad.  It was super good! We had Roti which is one of the best foods I've had here in Florida.   and she has pet eels, so we got to feed those too:)

I was studying this week on how to stay faithful and excited in the work and turned to the examples of Paul and Job.  They both went through a ton of stuff that hardly anyone else will go through, yet they remained faithful to God knowing that it would all work out.  Paul was promised exaltation and Job received twice as much as he had before he went through his many trials.  This upcoming transfer we will focus on not losing faith and staying positive amid trials and challenges.  

Summer is coming up real fast! it got up to 98 degrees on sunday and has been raining frequently. Last night it rained a ton and flooded all the streets, almost flooded the engine when my comp accidentally drove into a "lake" in a parking lot:)

Love you!

Elder Spencer Bailey

1. pic of us at Tasiea's

2. pic of what happens when we show up to the church and there are tons of flowers in the church parking lot along with one of our DL's car

we also bought a beta fish for our Rc eveline, she had a fish tank with no fish in it, so this was our baptism gift for her

4/20/15 | "Tight like unto a dish"

Hey Family!

We worked real hard this week to find and work effectively in our area. It payed off! we baptized Eveline on Saturday and she is such a solid RC and will greatly bless the Hollywood Ward.  I never knew how exhausted you can get and still somehow keep working, I've become pretty good friends with Mt. Dew Kick starts:)  Also totally forgot that 2 weeks ago we did a zone training, it was a lot of fun to plan with Elder Hayward.  We created this idea to make a Zone Leader meal calendar and have companionships sign up to bring snacks to District trainings, we didn't think it would actually work, but it's turned out to be quite successful:)  

Yesterday we had a huge miracle! We are working with the niece and nephew of a member and we rounded them up yesterday and they brought both of their parents to Church!  We talked with them and they said they were both interested in learning more about the Church and wanted to be baptized!  They have visited the church in Haiti many times with family but never got around to being baptized.  Miracles!

Today I was studying in Ether when they are setting out in their homemade barges.  I was curious of what the word "tight" meant so I looked up the definition and it means "made to keep water or air out or in."  The phrase "tight like unto a dish" makes  a lot more sense now.  The Jaredite barges were blown across the ocean and "they were many times buried in the depths of the sea, because of the mountain waves... when they were buried in the deep there was no water that could hurt them, their vessels being tight like unto a dish."

I made some comparisons with us and this story.

Our bodies are like the barges.  The lights/stones in the barges are like the light of Christ which is in each of us.  The winds/waves are like challenges or trials or temptations that we pass through.  

We need to be "tight like unto a dish" so that when Satan attacks us or when we go through trials or challenges "[they] will have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo" (Hel. 5:12).  Whenever we give into temptation or trials we get cracks in the barges which allows water to enter or guilt and shame.  Once the barge fills up, it sinks.  The way to combat this is to "[commend] [ourselves] unto God."  Just as God always brought the barges out of the depth of the sea, He can bring us up out of despair and help us get through trials that come our way.  

Cant think of anything else that happened this week. Time flies by so fast!! It's been a lot of fun being in this area with Elder Hayward, we get along great so it's been fun!

Love you all!

Elder Spencer Bailey

heres a pic of mah zone!!!

4/13/15 | Don't mess with Canada

Heyo Family!!

This week was exhausting but it was a great week!  We took our investigator Evelyn to the Temple on Thursday night and it was an incredible experience, she's being baptized on Saturday!  We worked really hard to find the elect and struggled through the second half of the week but were greatly blessed last night.

Miracle: We went up to a random member at church that we wanted to get to know better and asked him if we could stop by later to share a message with his family. He agreed so we went over that afternoon and got to know him. (turns out he's a professional volleyball player from Haiti, but that's besides the point) It turned out that his non-member niece and nephew were over, David and Queen (both age 14), so we got to know them too by throwing in some H2BT.  We taught the Resto using the new pamphlet teaching style and they understood it perfectly. When we were teaching about the authority being restored, they asked if they could be baptized by that authority, it was awesome! We have them set for the 2nd of May! God works in mysterious ways!

That ties into what I studied.  I read in 3 Nephi 21:10, "my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil." With God on our side we can outwit the devil and avoid or withstand temptation and sin.  We've been working on helping our investigators understand this so that they will rely on God and not let the devil anti them.  God will always win!

Had a crazy experience the other night.  We live in a 4-man apartment and are always pulling pranks on the other guys.  One is  a short Filipino named Elder Rubio the other is a stereotypical Canadian, Elder Keith whos been out for 3 weeks.  Most of our pranks have been aimed at Elder Rubio because he's fun to tease and because we arent sure how Elder Keith would react. The other night after we finished praying, we had the brilliant idea to go bombard elder rubio with pillows.  We stealthily snuck into their room then got jumped by an angry canadian, his fists were swinging and everything! We ran back to our room pretty quick.  

Canada 1   America 0

On the flip side, we had a dozen confetti eggs that mom sent me for easter.  We got home before the other elders and waited around the corner of the building.  As they came around the corner they got pelted with confetti eggs, it was way fun! thanks again for the eggs mom!

Canada 1  America 1

President told us to make sure we help them have fun, even pulling pranks, to help Elder Keith break out of his shell, it appears to be working:)

I love you guys, have a great week!!!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey

4/6/15

Hey family!

This week was one of the busiest weeks of my mission! It was great!  Little breakdown: 

Monday- 2 Baptismal interviews after pday

Tuesday- 2 District trainings, then 2 baptisms that night

Wed- moved all day into a new apartment

Thurs- MLC with the head of proselyting, lasted 6 hours

Friday- Exchanges, 

Sat and Sun- General Conference, which was awesome!

 we were greatly blessed during the little amount of time we had to work in our own area.  Tasiea was baptized on Tuesday!!! The drought is over and we have 2 more extremely solid investigators being baptized in April!  We also had an amazing media referral miracle.

We called one of the referrals we received, Loie, on Tuesday and he was very anxious to visit with us.  We met with him on Thursday and he is so elect! He recently was divorced after 50 years of marriage and moved back down here just last week.  His sister and bro-in-law are members of the church but they never talked about the Church until the last few weeks when all these trials were happening in Loie's life.  He became very interested in what the Church was all about so he went to the website and referred himself for us to come over and tell him about the Church.  We started off by setting strong expectations that our purpose was to help him grow closer to Jesus Christ and to increase his faith through baptism.  We did H2BT and invited the Spirit.  He asked the question, "you keep bringing up baptism, I've been baptized before in the Lutheran church, but they let me down years ago.  So, if I want to receive these blessings and this happiness you're talking about, do I need to be baptized again?" We replied yes and that we would be there every step of the way.  We went into teaching the Restoration with the pamphlets just the way we learned earlier that day at MLC and it worked great!  He understood it all and owned his own date by saying, "What more do I need to do so that I can be baptized on the 25th?"  We re-established expectations and he came to Conference on Saturday and can't wait for the 25th!! 

I have just a little thought I learned from my studies.  I was reading in 3 Nephi and in chapter 18 verse 7 it reads, "If ye do always remember me ye shall have my spirit to be with you." this phrase is repeated a few verses later.  I know that as we remember Christ throughout the day we will receive the Spirit to be with us and to give us power and authority because this is His work!

Not much else happened this past week, It flew by!  Love you all, have a great week!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey